"It could be."
"Yet you seem unsure," she said.
Pembroke smiled, uneasily. There was something not entirely normal about her conversation. Though the rest of her compensated for that.
"Tell me what's wrong with me," she went on urgently. "I'm not good enough, am I? I mean, there's something wrong with the way I look or act. Isn't there? Please help me, please!"
"You're not casual enough, for one thing," said Pembroke, deciding to play along with her for the moment. "You're too tense. Also you're a bit knock-kneed, not that it matters. Is that what you wanted to hear?"
"Yes, yes—I mean, I suppose so. I can try to be more casual. But I don't know what to do about my knees," she said wistfully, staring across at the smooth, tan limbs. "Do you think I'm okay otherwise? I mean, as a whole I'm not so bad, am I? Oh, please tell me."
"How about talking it over at supper tonight?" Pembroke proposed. "Maybe with less distraction I'll have a better picture of you—as a whole."
"Oh, that's very generous of you," the woman told him. She scribbled a name and an address on a small piece of paper and handed it to him. "Any time after six," she said.
Pembroke left the beach and walked through several small specialty shops. He tried to get the woman off his mind, but the oddness of her conversation continued to bother him. She was right about being different, but it was her concern about being different that made her so. How to explain that to her?